Booking Forest Avenue for dinner recently, I was delighted to be finally going somewhere that has been on my list a long time. We love their sister restaurant, Forest & Marcy, which made us all the more excited for this one. We made our way to Sussex Terrace after work on a Thursday evening. Inside,…

Aldi have released a couple of new gins to the Irish market for the Christmas season, one of which is Needle Blackforest Distiller Dry Gin. I was really excited to pick up a bottle of this, as I generally love German gins and reading about Needle Gin, I thought it was one I would really…

Who doesn’t love Gin? Who doesn’t love Presents? Who doesn’t love Christmas? Who doesn’t love The Great Big GIN Gift Extravaganza Post? Well after the popularity of last years post not many, so at Gin and Griddle we have the Solution – It’s BACK ! The Great Big GIN Gift Extravaganza with all new ideas…

Last month, I won Best Food Review Blog at the Blog Awards Ireland 2017. Genuinely shocked, I had no expectation of wining, actually of even placing if I’m honest. There are so many fantastic food bloggers in Ireland, so to know that people think Gin & Griddle is worthy and in fact one of the…

As anyone who follows Gin & Griddle on Instagram or Twitter will know, we go to Dalkey quite often. We lived there for a long time, it was his before we met and we lived there together until just after we got married. It’s a special place for us, and somewhere we hope to live…

We were delighted to attend the California Wine Fair 2017 in the Shelbourne Hotel, last Thursday 28th of September. This first event in Dublin was a chance to reintroduce California wine to the Public and Trade. California Wine has suffered under the burden of excise increases and reduced spending on premium wine in Ireland over…

Last week we were invited to The Aldi Wine Lover’s Sale in the Cliff Town House on St. Stephen’s Green, to sample and taste their latest offerings. With a selection of sparkling, white, rose and red, the wines are the perfect match for an August Bank Holiday BBQ. All the wines are available from their 129…

An Irish gin that has been getting a lot of love in the last few months is Mór Irish Gin. They released a limited edition bottle for Pride that I was very excited to buy. It’s such a great bottle and label. So did Mór Irish Gin live up to the hype…? Say hello to the newest…

Right on the seafront, with commanding views of the beach, from Bray head around to Dalkey Island and beyond, it really is a great setting for Bray’s newest restaurant, or gastrobar, Butler & Barry. Butler & Barry, the story goes, were two eccentric gentlemen who travelled the world in the 1920s and 1930s. They returned…

On the banks of the Blackwater River, just outside Cappoquin in West Waterford, is Blackwater Distillery. And here at Blackwater Distillery they are making a gin with Wexford strawberries… The Gin Alongside their original No.5 Gin, Blackwater Distillery also make speciality gins including this one with freshly picked Wexford strawberries. The Strawberry gin is produced…

An oldie but a goodie on Gin & Griddle today, with one of our favourite spots for a bite to eat, especially on a weekend afternoon, TriBeCa in Ranelagh. Of course it helps that they have the best chicken wings in Dublin (bold statement I know!). Actually there are two places that have the best…

Last week we enjoyed one of the nicest sunny June weeks I can remember in a while. We were both off work for the week and with the fine weather we were drawn to the coast. On Monday we visited Dun Laoghaire, walked the pier and soaked up the sunshine. Whilst walking the east pier, we…

The Gin The Glendalough Distillery was established in 2011 by 5 friends who wanted to revive the heritage of craft distilling in Ireland. They started with poitín in 2012, then whiskey and then onto Gin… Traditionally they released seasonal gins with their first gin released in summer 2014. Guided by Geraldine Kavanagh from Wicklow Wild Foods, local botanicals,…

Bertha’s Revenge Small Batch Irish Milk Gin has been on my gin wish list for a long time now. I was very pleased to see it included in the recent gin sale in Dunnes Stores recently so I happily picked up a bottle and it’s now sitting proudly in my Gin collection! The Gin Justin…

Anytime we have been in Monkstown, we have looked wistfully in the window of Lobstar, never having a booking and it always being busy meant we had to walk on! So this time, we booked ahead, for brunch on St. Patrick’s Day and as it happened it was quiet while we were there, through the early…

We’ve found ourselves in Blackrock a few times recently and we were excited to see that Dunne & Crescenzi has opened in the Blackrock Shopping Centre (in the same unit as Clodagh McKenna’s place was previously). I’ve always liked Dunne & Crescenzi and their Dundrum offering, L’Officina, especially in the Summer months when you can…

I am definitely late to the Richmond party but as the saying goes, better late than never! I plan to rectify this now with further visits to this super neighbourhood restaurant. Located in Portobello, on the right hand side as you leave town heading towards Rathmines. For those of you old enough to remember, it’s…